Dear Christians, Your Pro-Life Vote Is Not Pro-Life

Thursday, September 29, 2016

As Christians who vote, we absolutely cannot continue to be led to believe that a vote for the Republican party is a vote for life.

It is not.

In fact, it’s a lie. It’s a pretty lie that political powers use to keep a clenched fist on the Evangelical vote. Why? Because they know good and well what to say and how to spin it in such a way that eases our conscience. They also know that many of us will not research or study, and will only listen to media sources that are right-wing talking heads.

But then there is ME!

And I like research.

So here we go. I will try my best to lay out my case as to why a Christian should not automatically vote Republican for the sake of their pro-life moral grounds.

First up:
The Republican party WILL NOT ban abortions. Period. It won’t happen. So, right off the bat, our pro-life vote is lost. More on this later on in the article.

The Republican Nominee:

Donald Trump was on record as being pro-choice for most of his adult life. He said he “has evolved on the issue much like Ronald Reagan.” That’s fine. After all, I’ve evolved on LOTS of issues. However, Trump's stance on abortion only began to change when he launched his campaign for president. Donald Trump has no plans to ban abortions or really adjust any of the laws currently in practice. He says here that he will limit late term abortions, allowing them to take place in cases of incest, rape, and health and life of the mother. The only thing he has said that might be different is that Planned Parenthood should not be federally funded if it performs abortions. Here’s the kicker though: Planned Parenthood is not the only place American women can have an abortion done. So, defunding them does little for pro-lifers. For a second here, I would like to draw your attention to the fact that Donald Trump has been a huge donor to Planned Parenthood, which is strange, because I didn’t know what he actually donated funds, but instead accepted funds (Gia, don’t get catty). Taking away funds from Planned Parenthood simply hurts the low-income women that use if for much more than abortion. And one more thing, here Trump tells Tim Russet that he will uphold partial birth abortions.

The Democratic Nominee:

In 2008, Clinton went on record as saying, “I think abortion should remain legal, but it needs to be safe and rare. And I have spent many years now, as a private citizen, and as First Lady, and now a senator, trying to make it rare, trying to create the conditions where women had other choices. I have supported adoption, foster care. I helped create the campaign against teen pregnancy and completed our goal ten years ago.”

When asked if she believed in life beginning at conception, she says, “I believe that the potential for life begins at conception. I am a Methodist, as you know. My church has struggled with this issue.”

I want to pause and point out that Hillary Clinton is able to actually tell the public that she is part of a church. Any church. Trump has not been able to do that.

Where does she stand on late term abortion? Despite those political memes that people love to circulate on social networks, she has a more conservative view and identical view as Donald Trump. Read more about that here.

Has Hillary been a long-time supporter of women’s rights to choose? Absolutely, but she has been consistent and never once changed her stance depending on if she was running for president or not. Will she always fight for women’s right to choose? Yes, she will. She will also fight for social programs and healthcare. She will fight for social security for out elders and make sure that we continue on a path similar to the one we've been on for nearly two decades.

I suppose you're in a pickle now...

So What To Do?
It’s very important to understand that your vote matters. But you must not give it to a man who does not mean what he says, and is easily swayed in his ideas thinking it will end abortion. You must not give your vote to a party believing that it’s the moral right or the the vote of the church. Whatever that means. Since the 1970’s, the Republican party as been looking for die-hard voters, and they found them in the “values voters” of Evangelicals. It was never about your values, but always about your votes. They know it's easier to focus on the unknown babies that have not yet been born. It's easier to love the vague possibility of human life that is cute and adorable and tiny. It is not as easy to actually love the human life that is standing right in front of you--the poor, the destitute, the homosexual, the dying old man or the refugee. That takes actual work, relationship, money in the form of tax dollars. No one has time for that. But we have all the time for the possibility of life.

What....? That's doesn't make sense.

Political powerhouses and president nominees of the past have often
dubbed the debate on abortion as the “dead-end debate” because they know
that Roe vs Wade simply will not be overturned,
nor do the political parties even want to overturn it. In truth, it’s really used to secure Evangelical voters, which is a huge fraction of the
Republican party supporters. As late as July 2016, Trump was said to
have secured 78% of the Evangelical vote, more than Mitt Romney had when
he was as the Republican nominee. But why? He isn’t actually pro-life.
He is lying to you and pulling at your morality card. And what will he
do for humans once they are born? What promises does he make to help
them achieve a long, healthy, successful life? Not a whole lot if
you happen to come our of the womb with a vagina. Both candidates will allow babies to be aborted.

That’s the truth.

When we decide to vote pro-life, let’s also allow that vote to encompass life after birth. Which candidate is truly pro-life for all people, in the womb and outside the womb? Because we cannot pretend to be pro-life when we are speaking only about darling babies. We must also be pro-life for the humans born that might become gay, that might be mentally ill and need access to care, who might be homeless not he street and need food, who might be a woman that can only afford a cervical cancer screening in a free clinic, or the immigrant that’s fleeing the slaughter on their homeland and needs a safe haven.

Pro-life is more than unborn babies.

Swallow that. Devour it’s truth. And decide what it actually means to you.

If you want to vote for Trump, that's okay, but don't do it believing he is pro-life. He's lying to you and so is the media.